Curlers take long road to Games

Junior curlers Bilal Islam and Kayla Gray didn’t miss with their last shot to qualify for the Ontario Winter Games in curling.

They also logged a lot of kilometres to do it, winning the under-21 mixed doubles at the northernmost qualifier in Atikokan, a town two hours west of Thunder Bay.

Islam, a first-year Queen’s University student, and Gray, who is from Stirling and in her first year at St. Lawrence College, defeated rinks from Fort Frances and Port Arthur to earn one of six qualifying spots to the Ontario Winter Games in Orillia, March 1-4.

How Islam and Gray, who play out of the Cataraqui Golf and Country Club, wound up in the most distant qualifier is a bit of story, too.

Under the rules set out by Curling Ontario, the six qualifiers were open, meaning a team could choose whichever qualifier it wanted to enter.

Despite two closer qualifiers — in North Grenville and Lindsay — coach Sabena Islam said the choice for Team Islam/Gray was to go north.

“We were trying to be a little strategic. We were looking at the odds. We did our research,” coach Islam said.

“It was important for the two of them to qualify. It’s their last chance,” added Islam, who said playing in the northern competition held some special meaning to her, too.

“I grew up in northern Ontario [in Ignace]. That’s where I learned to curl. It was sort of a fun trip.”

It involved a $338 entry fee, a flight to Thunder Bay and a two-hour car ride west. Atikokan, located just north of the Minnesota state border, is 1,811 kilometres from Kingston.

However, in their research they found that in past Ontario Winter Games qualifiers, the northern sites drew fewer teams.

Both the Atikokan qualifier and one in North Bay each had three teams contesting. By contrast, the North Grenville one, which was won by Team Hoton/Inglis from the Huntley Curling Club, had nine teams, including one from Belleville.

Coach Islam said that despite the small field at the Atikokan Curling Club, it wasn’t a case of dropping into an easy qualifier.

“It wasn’t like they were gimme games,” she said, pointing out that the Fort Frances team had Chris Silver of Sudbury, who lost out to Gerry Horgan at the northern Ontario junior championship. Horgan was the runnerup at the national final. Hailey Beaudry of Thunder Bay was the Northern Ontario representative at the Canadian junior girls championship.

Islam and Gray faced Team Beaudry/Silver first and dropped a 7-2 decision.

They got a rematch after the Fort Frances team lost to Port Arthur, 10-9.

“We were caught on the ice [slower and straight] in the first game, but we regrouped and played well,” coach Islam said. “Kayla had to draw the full four-foot or [the game] would have gone into an extra end.”

The 8-6 victory moved Islam and Gray into the final against Port Arthur.

In mixed doubles — the competition is making its Olympic Winter Games debut in Pyeongchang next week — five rocks are thrown. Gray was throwing the first and last rocks while Islam threw the middle three.

In the final, the game was tied 3-3 after five ends. With last-rock advantage in the sixth end, Islam and Gray invoked their “power play” option. Their rock is placed on the edge of the eight-foot and the opposition’s rock is placed as a guard.

The end went the Cataraqui team’s way when Bilal made a runback takeout to leave their team sitting three counters. The opposing skip’s attempt to draw crashed into a guard and Gray made her final draw shot to complete a four count.

Fort Frances got one back on its “power play” move in the seventh. In the final end, Gray executed the lightweight tick to nudge a centre-line guard off to the side, and Bilal made three takeouts to run Fort Frances out of rocks in a 7-4 win by Team Islam/Gray.

A new mixed doubles league at Cataraqui will help Islam and Gray keep their game tuned up for the Ontario Winter Games competition.

The other qualifiers for play in Orillia are teams from Sudbury, Unionville, London, Sudbury and Huntley.